this he remembers
by Bag Of Badgers
Summary: Secret Santa gift for emsiecat on tumblr. Holy Rome really wants to do something nice for Venice. HolyTalia with added Peaceful Family.


Ever since word reached him of how the Venetians repulsed the Magyar horde, perhaps, he has loved her.

He remembers that.

He remembers that he has visited Venice, because he must have, she was-is-was powerful and grand and full of buildings that reflected off the canals and Holy Rome remembers that too, that she was rich as her grandfather must have been.

He remembers a great sickness tearing through them all, and Austria had glared at her from across the room of the house all the nations fled to, outside of Kraków, and spat _it's _her _fault, she spread it to us_ at the heap of blankets and fever and bodies in canals in the corner, and he had said _stop that, it's not her fault, it was the infidels_ and Austria had said _she's almost an infidel anyway_ and Holy Rome had said _shut _up, _you're sick and you don't know what you're saying_ and rolled over and wondered exactly why it was he'd said that because from a purely neutral point of view, Venice almost was an infidel especially considering the Fourth Crusade but infidels were _bad _and _evil_ and Venice wasn't at all.

He remembers wars wars wars and a monk who Naples and the Papal States sneered at until the peasants rose up and there were fires, and he remembers seeing Venice during the wars of the Cognac league in the tents of diplomats and wishing it hadn't been him who'd sacked Rome because she must already think he's weak and uncultured but now, _now_, Venice must hate him now.

He remembers another war, and pain, and not much else. He remembers courts.

One thing he does remember, sharp and clear, is an opera about a golden apple at a wedding. Holy Rome remembers that; his emperor was marrying a Spanish princess and the opera took two days and it was amazing and there were shipwrecks, even, but when at the end Jupiter gave the apple to Margarita Teresa he turned to Austria and said _isn't the apple for the most beautiful person? _and Austria had said _yes_ and he'd said _well why are they giving it to her then? She's not the most beautiful, her chin is ugly_ and Hungary had started laughing and Austria had shushed them both, and then afterward Hungary had asked him _so who did you want the apple to go to? _and Holy Rome had said _Venice_ without a second thought and then she laughed again and he blushed.

Holy Rome remembers that, and not much else, it blends and mixes like the internal boundaries of the Empire inside his head until the Leopolds are the Maximilians are the Charleses are the Heinrichs and the treaty he's thinking of can't have been Münster or either of the Frankfurts and definitely not Baden, but. He remembers that.

Venice is in his house, now, too (his, but it's really Austria's) and it doesn't make sense, how could the Stato da Mar who defeated the Magyars and led the sack of Constantinople and ruled the eastern Mediterranean be another serving-girl? She doesn't seem to quite understand it either, going by the way she speaks to Austria, still imperious.

Sometimes he wonders if it's a ploy and she really is still an empire, and he dares not approach her then, but empire or no, she is not happy. Holy Rome knows that much. He knows, too, that he must help her, it is his duty and he should be gallant as befits an empire and he wants her to be happy. When he had seen her last, sitting in state at the right hand of the doge, they had talked for a small while and she had seemed happy then.

First he must find out what makes Venice happy.

She complains because of the food Austria gives her, so it must be that, and she likes to paint and go outdoors. Perhaps if he…

So Holy Rome plucks up his courage and asks Hungary which foods Venice likes best. He cannot ask Venice anyway, in case she begins to suspect. Hungary ruffles his hair (Holy Rome squawks at that, he's an _empire_ not a child and that isn't _dignified_) and tells him "She likes pasta, _kicsikém_, and fish dishes. And tiramisu, but you're not to make her that."

"Why not?"

Hungary grins a little more, "I'll tell you when you're older, _kicsikém_," and Holy Rome pouts.

Pasta. That's noodles, isn't it? Like spätzle? He can do spätzle. He can _do_ that.

Holy Rome spends _hours_ trying to make spätzle the way Prussia can do it, thick and buttery and good (he remembers that Prussia had made him spätzle once, but not when, and it can't have been recently because Austria says Prussia is a Bad Influence and Holy Rome is not to see him), but the counters are tall and the kitchens in Austria's house are busy and he can't get it _right_.

Eventually, Bohemia pronounces one of the batches correct, and Holy Rome checks the next item on the list he'd written down. Paints. Surely someone in the house must have some?

He searches late into the night. There are less people than he remembers; where are Courland and Belgium, didn't one of them have paints? Venice doesn't. Holy Rome knows that, if he knows anything about Venice she wouldn't use house paint to draw mustaches on Austria's portraits if she had anything else. House paints are not refined enough for someone like Venice.

Didn't Saxony have some pastels?

Holy Rome goes to check, and Saxony snaps at him for waking him up (unfair, Holy Rome is still in charge) and tells him "They're in the box on the secretary desk now get out of my room", and Holy Rome walks out with a rather tattered box of pastels.

Hungary chivvies him to bed, clucking at him about how even empires need their sleep, _kicsikém_, and Holy Rome is tired anyway, more tired than he'd thought…

He gets tired a lot, these days.

After breakfast the next day, he searches for Austria and finds him in the study.

"Can Venice take a day off today?"

Austria looks over the edge of his glasses, face unchanging. "Is there any particular reason?"

"N-n-no." He hides the little basket with the pastels and scrap paper and covered bowl of spätzle behind his back.

"Don't lie."

Holy Rome flushes red. "I'm not!"

Austria sighs at this. "Holy Rome."

"I—I wanted to talk to her."

And Austria smiles a little, an expression Holy Rome doesn't see much on him. "Find her and tell her she may have the day off," and he turns back to the letters from diplomats.

Holy Rome spends a long time searching, through corridors that always seem a little off to him, they should have a painting _here_ not there or the carpet shouldn't be there at all, and it seems an age before he looks into a room and sees Venice standing by the window staring out, broom by her side. Ducking back out of sight behind the doorframe, Holy Rome tries to take calming breaths and draw himself up to his full height, removing his hat and combing his hair flat with his fingers.

When he steps around the doorframe and into the room, clearing his throat, Venice jumps and her broom clatters to the floor. "Ah! H-Holy Rome, I d-didn't see you there—I—" She stands up straight, almost like a soldier on review. "Don't tell Mr. Austria I wasn't working!"

"I—uh—" Holy Rome doesn't know what to do, she's worried now and she's not supposed to be worried. "Austria said you can have the day off."

"Really?" Venice brightens immediately, and Holy Rome sighs in relief.

"Also I was thinking if you had the day off maybe w-wecouldgooutsidetothegardensandhavesomefoodanddrawmaybe."

Venice just looks at him in confusion.

Holy Rome stutters a few more times and turns to go and save some face while he can—

"What's in the basket?"

—He freezes.

"It's um. Some spätzle. I made it for you." He swallows, hard.

"Really?" Venice smiles at him, her bright eyes almost disappearing in round cheeks.

"I. Yes. Also I brought you these I mean technically they're Saxony's but he doesn't use them ever anymore so it's okay if we use them I think." He fishes in the basket and shoves the box of pastels at Venice.

She jumps again and holds them.

Final part. Deep breaths. "And if you want to eat outside w-with me Austria won't mind at all."

Venice seems to consider for a moment, then nods cheerily. "Sounds good!"

She sits next to him in the garden, almost touching, and exclaims over the spätzle and the late-spring flowers in full bloom and Holy Rome's attempt at drawing, a rather smeared rabbit, and he stares silently at her drawings of Saint Mark's and flowers and Austria pulling silly faces (all right, he might laugh a little at those), and then Austria says nothing when they come back even though Venice got muddy from running after the rabbits and Holy Rome's hat got battered, and Hungary smiles indulgently at them and asks about their day and Venice chirps about it and this.

This Holy Rome remembers.

He knows he always will.

* * *

NOTES

-the Venetians fought back the Magyar invasion in 899, and since Holy Rome has loved her ever since the 900s…

-the plague: Venetian/Italian traders were often blamed for the Black Death, along with Muslims and Arabs, and the Venetians were held highly suspect in the religious sphere due to the fact that they went and used the Fourth Crusade to sack Constantinople against direct orders from the Pope and they traded with the Islamic world; Kraków is in Poland, which avoided much of the Plague's damage because it was largely rural and many Poles had a blood type resistant to the plague

-the wars of the Cognac League took place in the 1520s and one of the effects was the Sack of Rome by Charles V Habsburg's troops; the monk mentioned is Martin Luther, who was a cause of the German peasant revolts of the 1510s and 1520s even though he condemned them

-the opera mentioned is _Il pomo d'oro_, which was about the Judgment of Paris and took place at the wedding of Emperor Leopold I Habsburg and Margarita Teresa of Spain; at the end of it the golden apple was given to Margarita Teresa because she was the fairest

-doges are not a meme, they were the leaders of the Venetian empire

-_kicsikém_: Hungarian term meaning "my little one" or "dearie"

-tiramisu is a Venetian dessert, and also an aphrodisiac. Little Venice honestly just likes the taste and the coffee.

-spätzle is a type of German egg noodle

-Courland is an area of Latvia that was sort-of part of the HRE until 1561. Belgium was a part of the Austrian Empire until the Treaty of Campo Formio in 1797 (which gave Austria Venice) forced the Austrians to cede Belgium to Napoleonic France


End file.
